Written By: Yana Patel
On February 6th, 2023, two countries, Syria and Turkey, were tragically hit by an earthquake. This natural disaster was a big 7.8 magnitude earthquake, killing tens of thousands of people according to the New York Times. Turkey had more than 29,000 people who had died from the earthquake whereas Syria had 3,500 people who died.
The massive earthquake led to extreme damages in both of the countries. Many buildings and homes were destroyed leaving thousands of people without any shelter having to survive in the rain, snow, and temperatures dropping below the freezing point. With the need for shelter, millions of people need aid as well. According to the United Nations, the earthquake has affected 10.9 million people and 5.3 million of those people have lost their homes.
Rescue workers have pulled thousands of survivors who got trapped under the wreckage of the buildings. Even looking through all the rubble, there is still barely any hope that anyone is still alive after the quake.
For the survivors in Syria and Turkey, the situation for them is dreadful. Some people are resisting to return to their homes. Others are also using bonfires from pieces of debris from the quake just to stay warm. There are frequent power outages that have occurred as well. To add onto this, both countries are facing a shortage of food, fuel, and medical supplies as stated by New York Times. Dozens of countries have sent teams and supplies to help Turkey, who has imposed a three-month state of emergency in 10 territories.
Many buildings and much of the infrastructure collapsed in the earthquake. But it wasn’t only the earthquake’s fault for being so deadly. Originally, the building contractors had made the infrastructure weak, without having natural disasters in mind, as stated by Al Jazeera. Turkey had issued more than 100 arrest warrants of the building contractors, who helped make the structures that had fallen since the buildings collapsing was one of the main causes of many of the deaths in both countries.